4LAKids

• an online expansion of the dialog begun in the weekly 4LAKids e-newsletter - for parents, teachers, administrators, public policy makers and community members of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD)
• Scott Folsom is a parent and parent leader in LAUSD — he is Past President of Los Angeles 10th District PTSA and represents PTA on the LAUSD Construction Bond Citizen's Oversight Committee.
• In this forum the opinions are his own — your opinions and feedback are invited.

“Funding for this program is brought to you through the generous
contributions by the following foundations, corporations and
individuals.”

There follows a crawl – or series of slides – with the names of the
who’s who of Masters of the Universe of Corporate Philanthropy

Fords and Rockefellers and Carnegies; Gates and Waltons and Kochs and
Buffetts and their ilk. MacArthurs the Silicon Valley Crowd and
Hamburger Heiresses and the Wall Street Bunch - spreading their wealth
and culture and education and preconceptions and philosophy and good
taste.

Sometimes there are small little funds – contributed in the name of some worthy worthy of recognition.

Sometimes there is even actual government money from the National
Endowment for the Humanities or the US Department of Education …funding
Arts and Science and Ken Burns and NPR and PBS.

Thank God for them and viewers like me who fund this station and this
after-school program at my school and for special coverage of Education
News in my local newspaper.

It says that the contributors have no editorial control or say in the
content …and they can’t actually write that is if isn’t true.

Right?

BOXERS …OR BREVITY?

This issue of 4LAKids is necessarily brief; it takes more energy to
assemble this puppy than I seem to possess at the current moment.

Last week Their Excellences’ the Board of Education of the City of Los
Angeles in their infinite wisdom – reelected Steve Zimmer as their
president.

Steve is a dear friend – and brevity has never been his strongest point.
Part of the discussion around his reelection was bout starting+ending
meetings in a timely and respectful manner; keeping the proceedings on
agenda+schedule and the chin music to a minimum.

In the end the meeting collapsed into a deep, robust and verbose discussion about brevity.

“We have met the enemy,” the cartoon possum says. “And he is us!”

¡Onward/Adelante! - smf

Deasy-vu? :: SOME VERGARA “FRIENDS” PETITION THE CALIFORNIA SUPREME COURT
by Mercedes Schneider in her blog deutsch29 | http://bit.ly/29Ft7We
NOTE: All Links are live at the source site!

Below is the part of the CA ruling that likely spells doom for
similarly-styled litigation that tries to argue that teacher
evaluation/retention statutes should be overturned because they advance
“disparities in education opportunity”:

Plaintiffs failed to establish that the challenged statutes violate
equal protection, primarily because they did not show that the statutes
inevitably cause a certain group of students to receive an education
inferior to the education received by other students. Although the
statutes may lead to the hiring and retention of more ineffective
teachers than a hypothetical alternative system would, the statutes do
not address the assignment of teachers; instead, administrators—not the
statutes—ultimately determine where teachers within a district are
assigned to teach. Critically, plaintiffs failed to show that the
statutes themselves make any certain group of students more likely to be
taught by ineffective teachers than any other group of students.

With no proper showing of a constitutional violation, the court is
without power to strike down the challenged statutes. The court’s job is
merely to determine whether the statutes are constitutional, not if
they are “a good idea.” [Emphasis added.]

On May 24, 2016, Vergara plaintiffs petitioned the California Supreme
Court to consider reviewing the case. As of July 05, 2016, the
California Supreme Court extended its deadline to make a decision as to
whether or not it would review the case-- that such a decision would be
made up "to and including ‪August 22, 2016‬‬, or the date upon which
review is either granted or denied."

Meanwhile, individuals and organizations are contacting the court and
offering advice ("amici curae", or, as former Supreme Court Justice
William Rehnquist noted, "... a phrase that literally means 'friend of
the court' -- someone who is not a party to the litigation, but who
believes that the court's decision may affect its interest.")

Among those "friendly" letters to the California Supreme Court is this
one, dated June 13, 2016, from "amici" ("friends") John Deasy, John
White, Hanna Skandera, Steve Canavero, Mark Murphy, Kevin Huffman, Cami
Anderson, Jean-Claude Brizard, and Randolph Ward-- a number of whom are
current members of John White-led Chiefs for Change.

What is sad is that only 5 of the 10 are currently superintendents-- including the lead dog, John Deasy.
In their bio sketches, this crew paint themselves as successful,
dedicated *educators.* For example, Deasy omits his former Gates
Foundation connection or his current Broad Center employment. And no
mention of his frequent absence from Los Angeles schools at critical
times or of those costly, scandalous iPads. (Read that dose of Deasy
reality here.)

John White glosses right over the at-best tepid *success* of a state-run
Louisiana Recovery School District (RSD) that is on its way back to
local control without its ever having achieved a single A school and
only a handful of B schools-- and the last ACT composite was either 15.7
or 16.6 (it depends upon which White-promoted number one chooses.)
Instead, White's amici bio highlights his time in New York, where he
purportedly "[led] that city's efforts to turn around failing schools."

As for Hanna Skandera: No mention of her downplayed role as surprise chair of the dangling PARCC consortium.

Then there is former Delaware ed superintendent Mark Murphy, who left
that post almost a year ago, in August 2015, to "pursue other
opportunities" but whose Linkedin bio reflects no "other opportunity"
and still has him at the post he resigned.

Kevin Huffman is also presented as "was a superintendent"; no mention of
his resigning from his position as Tennessee state ed superintendent in
the face of faltering confidence from more than 50 local
superintendents-- coupled with his failure to live up to the
Tennessee-state-run-school goal of raising the bottom 5 percent of
schools to the top 25 percent of schools in 5 years.

Not even close, as Gary Rubinstein noted in May 2016: "Four years into
the five year experiment, five of the six original schools are in the
bottom 2.5% while one of the six is in the bottom 7%." State-run
Achievement School District (ASD) superintendent Chris Barbic resigned
effective December 2015 for not remotely coming close to that
top-25-percent goal. Still, in Huffman's "amici" bio, Huffman is
portrayed as having "played a central role in devising on-going plans to
move schools rated in the bottom 5% for performance in Tennessee to the
top 25% by 2018."

Cami Anderson is another has-been whose bio begins in past tense for her
time in Newark but with no mention of where she is now. Described by
the New York Times as a "lightening rod," Anderson resigned from Newark
over a year ago, in June 2015. According to her Linkedin bio, Anderson
is "founder and managing partner of Thirdway Solutions," where she helps
nonprofits and others "forge new paths" and "find new approaches."

Anderson as Thirdway founder/managing partner is not mentioned in her "amici" bio.
If the purpose of an amicus curae is to convince the court that one has a
vested interest in the outcome of a case, it seems that withholding
one's actual current professional employment in favor of promoting a bio
featuring a has-been role is deceptive on its face.

So much for being a "friend of the court."
On to the next has-been: Jean-Claude Brizard, who was run out of Chicago
almost four years ago, in October 2012 (and replaced by Barbara Byrd
Bennett, who three years later, in October 2015, plead guilty to a
kickback scheme and is now in prison.) In September 2015, Brizard took a
job as an educational consultant with Cross & Joftus.

As for the remaining two names: Steve Canavero is a charter promoter
from Nevada, and Randolph Ward, who has been San Diego superintendent
for ten years, since August 2006-- and who is the only *superintendent*
out of all 10 who is actually currently a California superintendent
making this *friendly* appeal to a California court.

And what, exactly do these folks want?

Here is a snippet:

The Court of Appeal's decision, if permitted to stand, will hamstring
the efforts of California's education leaders and practitioners to act
in the best interest of students and will perpetuate the deprivation of
California's low-income and minority students of their fundamental
constitutional right to equal educational opportunity. The future of
California's education system, which educates over 12 percent of the
nation's elementary and secondary public school students, has an impact
far beyond state lines.
If California educates such a large proportion of America's students,
you'd think that there would be more than one current California
superintendent included in the amici list.

MOVING ON :: THE AMICI CONTINUE:

As one of the largest in the country, California's education system--
and the laws that regulate that system-- have great influence on the
policies and practices followed in other states. The outcome of this
case, therefore, can be expected to have far-reaching repercussions and
shape the national conversation regarding teacher effectiveness
policies, including in the states in which the education leaders
submitting this brief have been most active.

I must say, I like how this corporate reform cadre creatively dodges the
glaring fact that half are no longer superintendents-- and not even
employed with school systems.

After the amici state and restate the influence of California's policies
on the rest of the nation, they state that California is only one of
four states to award tenure in less than three years. So, if California
is so influential, wouldn't this awarding of tenure in less than three
years be actively spreading to other states?

Perhaps that is one fear of this amici. However, that is not what this
lawsuit is really about. It is about whether "the statutes themselves
make any certain group of students more likely to be taught by
ineffective teachers than any other group of students."

This crew wants the California Supreme Court to "grant review in the
above-entitled case and protect the students in our country's most
populous state from the dire, long-lasting, and ultimately avoidable
consequences of unequal access to the foundation of a quality education:
effective teachers."

Again, the problem is that these predominately-used-to-be
superintendents do not address the issue raised by the Court of Appeals:
That the statutes they want overturned do not address the assignment of
teachers. (See bolded text at outset of this post.)

They want the California Supreme Court to throw out statutes that they
do not like, and they want the Court to require "influential" California
to replace their teacher tenure laws with laws that resemble those in
other states.

Not enough of those "grossly ineffective" California teachers are
dismissed, and they end up teaching in schools that are predominately
populated with students of color.

But the statutes themselves do not cause this to happen. Administrators
evaluate teachers, and administrators assign teachers to schools.

These guys miss it even as they try to argue that they are right. In the
statement below, watch the "and." The amici assume that the "and" is
directly attributable to the statutes, but it is not:

All evidence points to the fact that it is California's uniquely
quality-blind and prescriptive teacher tenure, dismissal and layoff
statutes that result in the statewide retention of grossly ineffective
teachers and in the cumulative concentration of those teachers in
schools serving low-income and minority students. [Emphasis added.]

In Vergara vs. California, it does not matter whether California is
overrun by "grossly ineffective teachers." (I know CA isn't overrun by
grossly ineffective teachers, but bear with me.) What matters is that
any distribution of those teachers is not legislatively mandated nor is
it the direct result of application of California's teacher tenure,
dismissal, or layoff statutes.

A CODA
●●smf: This came in last week; as nasty a recent week as there has been in terms of bad news.

Thank you Alan - smf

It’s good to know that the first rule of organizing is
memorialized/confirmed by Gloria Steinem in her latest book, My Life on
the Road (page 177) :

I took a course in geology because I thought it was the easiest way of
fulfilling a science requirement. One day the professor took us out
into the Connecticut River Valley to show us the ”meander curves” of an
old-age river.

I was paying no attention because I had walked up a dirt path and found a
big turtle, a giant mud turtle about two feet across, on the muddy
embankment of an asphalt road. I was sure it was going to crawl onto
the road and be crushed by a car.

So with a lot of difficulty, I picked up this huge snapping turtle and slowly carried it down the road to the river,

Just as I had slipped it into the water and was watching it swim away, my geology professor came up behind me.

“You know,” he said quietly, “that turtle has probably spent a month
crawling up the dirt path to lay its eggs in the mud on the side of the
road — you have just put it back in the river.”

I felt terrible. I couldn’t believe what I had done, but it was too late.

It took me many more years to realize this parable had taught me the first rule of organizing,

What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:Scott.Schmerelson@lausd.net • 213-241-8333Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180Ref.Rodriguez@lausd.net • 213-241-5555George.McKenna@lausd.net • 213-241-6382Monica.Ratliff@lausd.net • 213-241-6388Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385Steve.Zimmer@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
...or the Superintendent:superintendent@lausd.net • 213-241-7000
...or your city councilperson, mayor, county supervisor, state
legislator, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the
president. Tell them what you really think! • Find your state
legislator based on your home address. Just go to: http://bit.ly/dqFdq2 • There are 26 mayors and five county supervisors representing jurisdictions within LAUSD, the mayor of LA can be reached at mayor@lacity.org • 213.978.0600
• Call or e-mail Governor Brown: 213-897-0322 e-mail: http://www.govmail.ca.gov/
• Open the dialogue. Write a letter to the editor. Circulate these
thoughts. Talk to the principal and teachers at your local school.
• Speak with your friends, neighbors and coworkers. Stay on top of education issues. Don't take my word for it!
• Get involved at your neighborhood school. Volunteer in the classroom.
Join your PTA. Serve on a School Site Council. Be there for a child -
and ultimately: For all children.
• If you are eligible to become a citizen, BECOME ONE.
• If you a a citizen, REGISTER TO VOTE at http://registertovote.ca.gov/
• If you are registered, VOTE LIKE THE FUTURE DEPENDS ON IT. THEY DO!

IN ONCE UPON A TIME long go potentially naughty
children were confronted by parents+teachers with dark figures torn from
current events to keep them in line; child alignment being a constant
goal.

The most infamous of these is the “Boogieman”, a reverse
anthropomorphism of Napoleon Bonaparte: The Monster Made More Monstrous…
”be afraid, little children: Be very afraid! …He’s comin’ to getcha!”

Ladies+Gentlemen, Boys+Girls: I give you Steve Barr!

__________

Imagine, if you will, my unreserved joy, at being copied on an e-mail earlier this week:

“Great News: I’m running for Mayor of Los Angeles!”

Together, we’re going to disrupt the political establishment and turn
our city around. We’re going to build a grassroots movement to rally
around and transform all of L.A.’s schools, end the homeless and
affordability crisis, and fight for a city where every family can
thrive.

I’m running because I love our city and I know how much it has to offer.
Over the years, I’ve seen how much we can accomplish when we stand
together and fight for what we know is right. That’s why we’re going to
build a fierce grassroots campaign powered by Angelenos to fight for our
city and our people.”

…sent by no less than Steve Barr. …because this city and the school system hasn’t had disruption enough!

(Steve has, in a moment of super genius/brand I.D., has made his campaign logo his name inside a […wait for it…]: GREEN DOT!)

Barr is, of course, the founder of Green Dot Public Schools – whose employ he left under-a-cloud years ago.

He was Mayor Tony’s ever-present “bestie” in Antonio’s battle to take
over LAUSD under AB1381 (feel free to sprinkle the adjective
“unconstitutional” freely in this passage) – making the Energizer Bunny
look like a slacker! It was Barr who took the appeal of AB 1381 all
the way to the State Supreme Court. Where it lost, 9-0.

Since then Barr’s School Reform/Charter School cred has worm rather
thin. He and Green Dot parted ways. He tried to become a “School
Turnaround King” in New Orleans.

A mutual acquaintance of Steve’s+mine …and a good friend of LAKids writes:

Jun 28, 2016: BARR JUST CAME OUT WITH HIS PLATFORM:
1. No children under 5 yr. old will be allowed to poop in their pants
2. All parents must wear their underwear on the outside of their pants
3. Schools should be funded by the amount of noise they generate
4. The mayor should give up on city streets and just build parking lots on school campuses
5. Students should not be taught to read nor write but just to give press conferences

[BURR]: How does a bastard, orphan, son of a whore and a
Scotsman, dropped in the middle of a
Forgotten spot in the Caribbean by providence
Impoverished, in squalor
Grow up to be a hero and a scholar?
[LAURENS]: The ten-dollar founding father without a father
Got a lot farther by working a lot harder
By being a lot smarter
By being a self-starter
By fourteen, they placed him in charge of a
Trading charter
[JEFFERSON]: And every day while slaves were being slaughtered and carted
Away across the waves, he struggled and kept his guard up
Inside, he was longing for something to be a part of
The brother was ready to beg, steal, borrow, or barter
[MADISON]: Then a hurricane came, and devastation reigned
Our man saw his future drip, dripping down the drain
Put a pencil to his temple, connected it to his brain
And he wrote his first refrain, a testament to his pain…

►CA State Constitution: Article IX § 6: “No school or college or any
other part of the Public School System shall be, directly or indirectly,
transferred from the Public School System or placed under the
jurisdiction of any authority other than one included within the Public
School System.”

June 27, 2016 :: Charter school founder Steve Barr on Monday filed
papers to run for Los Angeles mayor, launching a long-shot candidacy
that could reshape the dynamics of incumbent Mayor Eric Garcetti’s
reelection bid by drawing voters’ attention to the city’s struggling
school system.

Barr, a Silver Lake resident and darling of education-reform advocates
who has not previously held elected office, said he has grown impatient
with what he sees as Garcetti’s passivity in the face of a worsening
public education crisis. He said Garcetti is “a really nice guy” who
lacks “a sense of urgency” about solving the city’s problems, foremost
among them the shortcomings of the nation’s second-largest school
system.

“The school district – and I’m saying this as a big fan of the school
district, as a parent in the school district – in some ways is a little
bit like an alcoholic who hasn’t bottomed out yet,” Barr said. “It’s
getting better, but we can’t afford as a city to just let this thing
linger out there, because it’s not just affecting them anymore. It’s
affecting our city and it has for a long time.”

Barr’s entry into the 2017 race comes amid a historic push by local
activists to expand charter schools as an answer to problems in the Los
Angeles Unified School District, and is likely to revive debate around a
recurrent theme in L.A. government: the relationship between LAUSD and
City Hall. L.A.’s mayor, unlike those in Chicago or New York City, has
no formal authority over the school district.

That hasn’t stopped school quality from periodically dominating city
politics. Former Mayor Richard Riordan campaigned aggressively for
favored Board of Education candidates, incurring the enmity of the local
teachers’ union. Former Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa fueled his winning
2005 campaign against incumbent James Hahn with promises to reform
public education. (That goal eluded Villaraigosa once he was in office,
as his bid to take over the school district was defeated in court.)

In taking on Garcetti, Barr faces long odds against an incumbent who has
built a broad base of political support and an impressive fundraising
machine – and who has made no major missteps during his first three
years in office.

Jaime Regalado, an emeritus professor of political science at Cal State
L.A., said he thought nothing short of a serious scandal – or perhaps an
abrupt exit by Garcetti to accept an appointment in a Hillary Clinton
White House – would create “any chance at all” for Barr’s success.

Others cautioned against underestimating Barr’s appeal to an
unpredictable electorate in a city where public school quality still
tops most polls as an issue of voter concern.

“He’s running as an outsider at a time when voters are powerfully
suspicious of the political establishment, and he’s running on an issue
that’s close to the hearts of most Angelenos,” said Dan Schnur, director
of the Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics at USC. “It will be an
uphill fight for him, but this is something that Garcetti and his team
would be smart to take very seriously.”

Garcetti campaign manager Bill Carrick said that though the mayor has
not followed in Villaraigosa’s footsteps by trying to gain new formal
powers over the schools, he has implemented a number of programs
benefiting students. He pointed to Garcetti’s expansion of a summer jobs
program and his recently announced commitment to help fund a free year
of community college for every LAUSD student.

“Mayor Garcetti’s focus is on getting things done and on doing things
that are going to make a difference in the lives of young people across
L.A. and that are real and tangible,” Carrick said.

He also cautioned against viewing a mayor’s duties wholly through the
prism of education policy, noting that unrelated challenges such as
transportation are also among city officials’ top priorities.

“It’s one thing to be somebody who is focused on education as their
issue as an education advocate,” Carrick said. “It’s another thing to be
the mayor of a city where you have got a lot of issues.”

The only other challenger to Garcetti with political or public policy
experience who has entered the race is Mitchell Schwartz, a veteran
political consultant who directed President Obama’s 2008 campaign in
California and was communications director at the U.S. Department of
State under former President Bill Clinton.

Barr, 56, founded Green Dot Public Schools, a nonprofit chain of charter
schools that began operation in L.A. He oversaw the company’s
contentious takeover of Locke High School, marking the first time one of
L.A. Unified’s schools was turned over to a charter group. Barr stepped
down from Green Dot’s day-to-day leadership in 2009, but has remained
active in education policy at both the state and national level.

Barr was raised in Monterey and Cupertino by a single mother who worked
as a cocktail waitress and dental assistant. He spent a year in foster
care, went to a community college and joined the Teamsters when he
worked at United Parcel Service while finishing his degree at UC Santa
Barbara.

It is a background that differs markedly from that of Garcetti, who grew
up in Encino and attended an elite private high school before heading
off to Columbia and, eventually, to Oxford through a Rhodes Scholarship.

Asked about what some see as the foremost accomplishment of Garcetti’s
first term – his role in raising the city-wide minimum wage to $15 –
Barr demurred.

“The difference between him and I is I’ve actually lived on minimum
wage,” Barr said. “I understand it’s a great thing to get the minimum
wage up to $15 an hour. That’s fantastic. It’s not even close to
scratching the surface of what this city needs. And it wasn’t an
incredibly controversial stand when he took it.”

Barr said he doesn’t yet have a full-fledged plan for overhauling the
school district, but that two immediate areas for improvement are the
resources the district as a whole pours into administrative overhead and
the conditions at L.A.’s worst-performing schools.

He said he would prefer to work cooperatively with school district
officials, but would be willing to pursue changes in city or state law
to expand the mayor’s power were he to find his efforts stymied.

“The proposition for them is, ‘We’re going to rally around you, but
you’ve got to change. And mediocrity is no longer an option,’” Barr
said.

The viability of Barr’s campaign could hinge partly on whether he
secures the support of wealthy school-reform advocates in L.A., some of
whom are involved in a plan that could dramatically increase the number
of charter schools operating in the city.

A confidential draft of the plan obtained last year by The Times
described raising $490 million to move half of the school district’s
enrolled students into charters over the next eight years. Reform
advocates later backed away from the plan, but critics still worry about
a massive charter school expansion that could bankrupt the school
district by drawing away students – and the state funding that
accompanies them.

Frank Baxter, a businessman and former U.S. ambassador to Uruguay who
has actively supported charter schools, called Barr “one of the pioneers
in the charter movement in Los Angeles.”

Baxter declined to say whether he would support Barr’s candidacy, though he said Barr had informed him of his decision to run.

Billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad, another prominent backer of local
school-reform initiatives, was traveling outside the country and could
not be reached for comment.

July 1, 2016 :: LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Unified School District
Board of Education has unanimously approved nearly $11 million in
repairs for the historic tower and the administration building at John
Marshall High School. The board also approved a $160,000 investment to
modernize the school’s auditorium.

The original project, approved in August 2012, was slated to only repair
the exterior facade of the administration building’s tower. The newly
defined project will include the replacement of the roofing, repairs and
improvements to the historic tower, seismic strengthening and
accessibility upgrades to the entrance of the school.

The tower repairs were initially triggered by deteriorated and failing
building elements. Further studies were conducted after the initial
project was approved in 2012, and additional deficient building
conditions, such as water intrusion, were discovered in both the
administration building and the tower.

“I am overjoyed that the board has voted to fund the repairs to this
historic building,” Principal Patricia Heideman said. “The building is
incredibly important to the community around Marshall and the alumni who
have been so supportive of our students. The beautiful structure is
symbolic of the legacy that Marshall has maintained throughout the years
and is very dear to our community.”

Additionally, the school board approved funding to begin modernizing the
school’s auditorium. That effort was inspired by Heideman and community
members in order to renovate the auditorium to beautify the space and
to increase the auditorium’s sound quality to meet the needs of the
visual and performing arts programs at the school.

“We know that Marshall High School is extremely special to this
community because of its close ties with the Los Feliz family,” said Ref
Rodriguez, who represents District 5 where Marshall High is located on
the school board. “I appreciate the advocacy of the parents, alumni,
neighbors, and community members that support Marshall High, which is
why my office has chosen to financially support the renovation of the
school’s historic auditorium.”

Heideman said she welcomes the repair to the auditorium.

“We are grateful that the board and Dr. Rodriguez, in particular,
recognize and are willing to support the desperately needed improvements
to the auditorium to make it more functional. On behalf of the John
Marshall High School community, I offer my sincere gratitude to the
LAUSD.”

Thursday, June 30, 2016 7:28 am :: Summer classes have begun at 71 Los
Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) high schools and — for the
first time in several years — the district is offering elective and
enrichment courses, as well as classes in core academic subjects for
students needing to make up credits.

Approximately 65,000 students are enrolled in more than 2,500 classes
during the most robust summer session since the recession. In addition
to the high school classes, the district is offering a summer “bridge”
program at more than 120 elementary and middle schools, where students
are receiving supplemental instruction in English and math.

“We are very pleased that we are able to extend summer learning
opportunities to so many students,” said District Superintendent
Michelle King. “By offering a slate of electives, credit-recovery
courses and academic supports, we are reinforcing our commitment to
personalizing the educational experience and helping our students
succeed.”

Summer classes will run for 24 days, with two periods of 2 1/2 hours
each that will start at 9 a.m. and noon. That’s an hour later than
previous years; officials hope the extra time will improve student
attendance and punctuality.

The district is also providing counselors to act as “case managers” in
supporting students and helping them overcome hurdles that might
otherwise derail their progress toward graduation.

In addition, the program is being rebranded as “summer term” so that
students will come to see the classes as simply an extension of the
regular school year.

“LAUSD is shifting mindsets toward increased excellence with the concept
of ‘summer term’ rather than ‘summer school,’ as we prepare students to
consider ongoing learning,” said Dr. Frances Gipson, chief academic
officer.

“Our educators have engaged in ‘mastery learning’ professional
development to calibrate and reach high expectations,” she continued.
“These expectations are supported by counselors being present this
summer, alongside teacher leaders, who will guide professional learning
to support the differentiated needs of students — much like a coach.
And, we are proud to bring back enrichment and ‘bridge’ programs for
students.”

This year’s summer term stands in sharp contrast to those during the
recession, when the district served just 5,000 students at 16 high
schools.

With an allocation of $2 million for this summer, the district will
offer credit-recovery courses in English, math, science, social science,
world languages, physical education and health.

In addition, electives are being offered at Hollywood and Los Angeles
High schools, Foshay and International Studies Learning centers, and
Cleveland Charter High School. Courses include graphic design,
photography, stage design, computer science and beginning dance.

Summer term is administered through the district’s Beyond the Bell Branch. For a complete list of schools, see btb.lausd.net.

“We’re back on track to being able to offer more than just
credit-recovery courses,” said Alvaro Cortes, executive director of
Beyond the Bell. “It’s great that we finally have the ability to add
expanded programming for our students.”

What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:Scott.Schmerelson@lausd.net • 213-241-8333Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180Ref.Rodriguez@lausd.net • 213-241-5555George.McKenna@lausd.net • 213-241-6382Monica.Ratliff@lausd.net • 213-241-6388Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385Steve.Zimmer@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
...or the Superintendent:superintendent@lausd.net • 213-241-7000
...or your city councilperson, mayor, county supervisor, state
legislator, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the
president. Tell them what you really think! • Find your state
legislator based on your home address. Just go to: http://bit.ly/dqFdq2 • There are 26 mayors and five county supervisors representing jurisdictions within LAUSD, the mayor of LA can be reached at mayor@lacity.org • 213.978.0600
• Call or e-mail Governor Brown: 213-897-0322 e-mail: http://www.govmail.ca.gov/
• Open the dialogue. Write a letter to the editor. Circulate these
thoughts. Talk to the principal and teachers at your local school.
• Speak with your friends, neighbors and coworkers. Stay on top of education issues. Don't take my word for it!
• Get involved at your neighborhood school. Volunteer in the classroom.
Join your PTA. Serve on a School Site Council. Be there for a child -
and ultimately: For all children.
• If you are eligible to become a citizen, BECOME ONE.
• If you a a citizen, REGISTER TO VOTE at http://registertovote.ca.gov/
• If you are registered, VOTE LIKE THE FUTURE DEPENDS ON IT. THEY DO!

Sometimes [hopefully] it's about what went right/turned out well/shows promise.

And sometimes it's about what’s been going on, institutionally …or just
in the fringes – not below the radar -but certainly in the chaff.

This week it’s a homework assignment+research project about two entities:

THE L.A. FUND FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION. [lafund.org]
andLA’s PROMISE [laspromise.org]

FIRST: Read that first two articles (following). Consider the sources.
.
Google the two funds. Wikipedia them. Look up their Form 990’s. Copy
your work to Julian Assange & Edward Snowden …though they
undoubtedly already know – a secrets go this one isn't very!

Add 4LAKids to the search string (…I'm one of my favorite authors on the
subject!) As you dig into the sordid tale you will discover this is
part of the SONY Pictures e-mail hack by North Korean cyber hackers!
LAUSD shenanigans; the international incident!

Please do the research. Please do the homework. Please tell me if you don't conclude that:

1. THE L.A. FUND FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION and L.A.’s PROMISE are and always
have been pretty much the same entity/cast o’ characters/unusual
suspects up to their usual mischief with as little of their own money
and as much as the public’s as possible.
2. and that this “merger” is:
A. a not-clever-enough-by-half way to “repurpose” tax-exempt donated funds intended to assist LAUSD schools+students TO
B. assist charter schools+students …and to perhaps enrich the principals
and further their goals, programs and business enterprises.

June 23, 2016 :: Two nonprofit educational organizations said Thursday
they are merging, with plans to expand their programs that largely
operate in the Los Angeles Unified school district to districts
countywide.

The two groups, LA’s Promise and the Los Angeles Fund for Public
Education, said the new organization, the LA Promise Fund for Public
Schools, will offer their current programs to the 80 other school
districts within Los Angeles County, the most populous in California.
The aim is to enhance academic and career prospects through enrichment
programs for a greater number of students.

“Today is day one,” said Veronica Melvin, the CEO of LA’s Promise, who
will lead the new organization. “Our approach will be to engage
one-on-one with superintendents or board members across the county to
let them know how we can help them grow.”

Thursday’s announcement is the second in recent months by private
organizations embarking on a fundraising drive to help students in and
around Los Angeles. It follows the creation of Great Public Schools Now,
whose goal is to identify successful programs within L.A. Unified, the
second-largest school district in the country, and replicate them
through financial grants in high-poverty neighborhoods within the
district.

The two efforts are unrelated, but taken together, they reflect a
willingness of outside organizations to aid public school districts at a
time when many of them are pressing to balance a high demand for
quality education with budgetary constraints. The L.A. Unified board
this week approved a $7.6 billion budget for the coming school year, but
district officials have warned of a possible deficit by 2018-2019.

The new entity will continue to run three schools in south Los Angeles
that have been managed by LA’s Promise since 2006. Those schools are the
result of a negotiated arrangement with the district that
differentiates them from traditional L.A.Unified schools in how they’re
run in an effort to improve academic performance. The schools – two
large South L.A. high schools (Manual Arts and West Adams Prep) and one
middle school (John Muir) – have greater autonomy over budget,
curriculum, instruction, schedule and staffing, but all employees are
members of unions. The L.A. Unified board recently denied the group’s
application to open two charter schools, a middle school for the coming
school year and a high school for the 2017-18 school year, but that
decision was overturned on appeal by the Los Angeles County Board of
Education.

The LA Fund managed a range of in-school programs throughout Los Angeles
County, including Girls Build LA, an empowerment program that has
reached more than 7,000 girls; The Intern Project, a paid internship
program for high school students at companies like SpaceX and
Participant Media; #ArtsMatter, an advocacy program that integrates arts
and creativity into core curriculum; andGrants HQ, which offers
personalized training and support to thousands of educators seeking
additional classroom resources.

Melvin said the new LA Promise Fund intends to spend the next three
months identifying specific goals, strategies for implementing them and
fundraising. Each of the merging organizations has an annual budget of
$3 million.

“Over the past several years, LA’s Promise and the LA Fund have both
compiled impressive track records with programs that empower students
both inside and outside the classroom,” Megan Chernin, who serves on the
boards of both merging organizations, said in a statement. “The new
enterprise formed by the combination of these two extraordinary
organizations will be in a unique position to seed great programs that
can then be developed and rolled out across the county.”

Without specifically citing the new organization, L.A. unified
Superintendent Michelle King said in a statement, “The District is
always open to new strategies for improving our schools, and we look
forward to discussions that will help us better serve our students.”

FUND SET UP TO RAISE MONEY FOR L.A. UNIFIED MERGES WITH GROUP STARTING TWO CHARTER SCHOOLS
by Howard Blume and Zahira Torres | LA Times | http://lat.ms/28WNuLr

June 23, 2016 :: Former L.A. Unified Supt. John Deasy and Hollywood
philanthropist Megan Chernin had ambitious goals in 2011 when they
announced the creation of a nonprofit that in five years would raise
$200 million for district students.

They said the Los Angeles Fund for Education, with fundraising prowess
and freedom from bureaucratic constraints, would help revolutionize a
district that had long struggled to educate its children.

The nonprofit fell far short of that fundraising goal, drawing about $7
million in donations from its inception to 2014, according to the most
recent tax documents available. Now, the LA Fund has announced a merger
that shifts its mission away from an exclusive focus on the district.

The LA Fund has joined forces with LA’s Promise, a nonprofit that
manages three district schools, to create LA Promise Fund, a new
organization whose goals will include forming charter schools.

“We were left no other option” but to open charter schools, said
Chernin, who serves on the boards of both groups. “We just want to have a
larger impact and we want to be more efficient about our impact.”

Chernin said the merger is, in part, a reflection of the groups’ limited
ability to work successfully with L.A. Unified, for which she faults
the school district.

The new nonprofit’s leaders say the decision also will reduce operating
costs, allowing it to serve more students across the county who live in
poverty.

But the new direction offers another sign that philanthropists who were
attempting to overhaul the nation’s second-largest school district from
within now are looking for other avenues.

“We want to create the maximum opportunities for the most
disenfranchised youth of Los Angeles and we realized that together we
could have a great impact,” said Veronica Melvin, the chief executive of
LA’s Promise, who will head the new group.

The decision comes as Los Angeles Unified contends with another reform
effort, originally spearheaded by the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation,
that sought to more than double the number of charter schools in the
city over eight years, a move that would slash the district’s enrollment
and state funding.

That proposal evolved into a plan put forward last week by the nonprofit
Great Public Schools Now, which says it wants to hand out grant money
to expand not just charters but any effective schools in L.A.’s
low-income neighborhoods – even potentially expanding good traditional
public schools.

The LA Promise Fund could be among the organizations that benefit.

L.A. Unified officials recently rejected a bid by LA’s Promise to start
two charter schools, saying the organization needed to concentrate
instead on improving achievement at the schools it already manages for
the district. The charters later were approved by the county.

“I hope this new effort is about collaboration and not competition,”
Board President Steve Zimmer said about the merger. “My door, our door,
is always open to collaboration. What we’ve learned is that conflict
and competition does not help kids.”

Deasy came up with the LA Fund and pursued donors interested in seeing a specific set of reforms at the district.

But after he resigned under pressure in October 2014, a political shift
in the school board left donors who supported his goals without a
powerful ally to pursue their favored reforms, which included making
test scores a key factor in teacher evaluations and opening more charter
schools.

Some blamed Deasy’s departure for the LA Fund’s anemic fundraising. But
even while he was in office, the donations didn’t pour in.

To raise an amount like $200 million, “you have to be responsive, you
have to work very carefully with your donors, you have to listen to your
donors,” said Antonia Hernandez, president and CEO of the California
Community Foundation, who said she applauds Chernin’s efforts and
supports the merger. She added that previously “the conditions were not
ideal for conveying a sense of confidence to the people giving money
that it would be well spent.”

The LA Fund helped launch Breakfast in the Classroom, a program to
provide food to all students at the start of the school day, which
brought in additional federal funding. Previously students had the
option of arriving before school to receive a free breakfast.

The fund also paid for an advertising campaign that stressed the
importance of arts education and sponsored teams of girls at 44 schools
that competed to develop solutions to community problems. Another of the
nonprofit’s initiatives linked teachers to classroom grant
opportunities and students to internships.

Leaders of the newly merged organization say the projects will continue and will be open to schools throughout L.A. County.

While L.A. Unified students are expected to derive some benefit, the
mega-district now is left without an outside foundation devoted to
supporting the 550,000 students in district-operated schools. By
contrast, the target of the Beverly Hills Education Foundation is to
raise an average of $1,000 per student, or about $4 million annually for
its more than 4,000 students.

The LA Promise Fund, which will have a budget of about $6 million, hopes
to create a pipeline of schools, extending from kindergarten through
12th grade.

“We wanted and would still love to do that with LAUSD, but it wasn’t on
the table for us,” Chernin said. “So we figured we could create
charters.”

Times staff writer Joy Resmovits contributed to this report.

►LA TIMES EDITOR'S NOTE: The Times’ Education Matters initiative
receives funding from a number of foundations, including one or more
mentioned in this article. The California Community Foundation and
United Way of Greater Los Angeles administer grants from the Baxter
Family Foundation, the Broad Foundation, the California Endowment and
the Wasserman Foundation. Under terms of the grants, The Times retains
complete control over editorial content.

UNDER PRESSURE TO PRODUCE BETTER NUMBERS, SCHOOL
OFFICIALS IN CALIFORNIA AND NATIONWIDE HAVE OFTEN DONE WHATEVER IT TAKES
TO GET TO THOSE NUMBERS
Editorial by The LA Times Editorial Board | http://lat.ms/28WRk7n

26 June 2016 :: In 2014, the Los Angeles Unified School District
announced a spectacular improvement in its graduation rate: Fully 77% of
students who had come in as 9th graders four years earlier were now
going to graduate as seniors. But there was a bit of a trick behind the
number: It included only students who attended what are called
“comprehensive” high schools. Those who had been transferred to
alternative programs — the students most at risk of dropping out —
weren’t counted. If they had been factored in, the rate would have been
67% — still good, but not nearly as flashy a number.

Here’s another example of a misleading number: In May of this year, the
California Department of Education reported a rise in the statewide
graduation rate, to 82%. But one reason for that was the cancellation of
the high school exit exam, which used to be required for graduation and
which students could pass only if they had attained a modicum of
understanding of algebra and English skills.

In a time when most middle-class jobs require at least some training
beyond 12th grade, raising the number of high school graduates is
considered essential. Dropouts are not only more likely to be
unemployed, but more likely to be imprisoned. That’s why the newly
passed federal education law, optimistically titled the Every Student
Succeeds Act, requires states to hold high schools accountable for
improving graduation rates.

The question, though, is whether schools will bring those numbers up the
hard way, by improving the quality of education – or by falling back on
shortcuts and gimmicks. Early indications suggest that they’ll do a
combination of both. States and school districts, not just locally but
across the nation, have already come up with a wide array of ways to
make graduation rates look good on paper:

-- When large numbers of students across the country failed high school
exit exams over the past decade, states made it easier for them to pass.
California devised a simpler test; in New Jersey, students who failed
were permitted to take a far easier exam that asked them only one
question for each subject area. And if they still failed, they could
appeal by doing an essay or another project. Last year in Camden, N.J.,
after nearly half the students flunked the initial exam, almost all of
them were able to get their diplomas through one of the other routes.

-- Several states, including California, have eliminated their high
school exit exams altogether. And California was among at least six
states — including Texas and Georgia — to award retroactive diplomas to
students who had failed their exit exams in previous years.

-- In Chicago, low-performing public school students were counseled to
leave school for job-training or graduate-equivalency programs, and then
counted as transfers rather than dropouts. When an outcry ensued, the
school district lowered its previously inflated graduation rates in
2015.

--Texas allows schools to count students as “leavers” rather than
dropouts if they say they’re moving elsewhere or doing home-schooling,
without checking into whether those assertions are true.

-- Perhaps the newest and most widespread method that schools are using
to boost graduation rates are online credit-recovery courses such as the
ones that L.A. Unified offered this academic year when only about 54%
of seniors were on track to graduate. After a hefty dose of online
credit-recovery courses and other efforts, the latest but still
preliminary figure is now reported to be 74%. These courses can be
rigorous and valuable educational tools – but they also sometimes allow
students to too quickly and too easily make up the courses they have
failed.

Russell Rumberger, director of the California Dropout Research Project
at UC Santa Barbara, is not a fan of measuring a school’s success by its
graduation rate for precisely that reason: Doing so encourages schools
to lower their standards or to use misleading numbers or to find ways to
get failing students out of their schools without having to count them
as dropouts. In any case, he says, “a diploma is a blunt instrument” for
measuring learning; one study found that low-income students need to
show better mastery of the material than merely a pass in order to have a
real shot at reaching the middle class.

Under pressure to produce better numbers, school officials in California
and nationwide have often done whatever it takes to get to those
numbers.

Like it or not, Rumberger says, higher standards — such as those in the
Common Core curriculum standards recently adopted in California and most
other states — tend to mean lower graduation rates, and it’s
disingenuous for states to say they can raise both at once, and quickly.

It’s not that schools, including those at L.A. Unified, haven’t made
some authentic progress in graduating more students. The district
deserves credit for taking steps to follow up on absent students before
they become chronically truant. It has eliminated out-of-school
suspensions for relatively minor misbehavior. (Rumberger was involved in
a recent study showing that suspension increases a student’s risk of
dropping out.) These days, high school staff at many schools seem to be
more personally familiar with students than they used to be, and the
students in turn seem more comfortable interacting with the adults.
Counselors more often take the initiative, sitting students down to talk
about how they will make up missing credits. And the district has been
offering after-school and Saturday makeup classes as well as the online
credit-recovery courses.

But under pressure to produce better numbers, school officials in
California and nationwide have often done whatever it takes to get to
those numbers, including lowering standards while pretending to raise
them, and reclassifying students instead of educating them. These
students then go on to college or the workplace, mistakenly thinking
they have the skills they’ll need.

The irony is that the school-reform movement that has been leading the
push for higher graduation rates got its start years ago in a struggle
to raise academic standards. It arose in response to complaints from
employers that a high school diploma hardly meant anything anymore.
School reformers and Chamber of Commerce representatives complained that
high school graduates couldn’t pass the written test to become delivery
drivers or construction apprentices. Standardized tests, including high
school exit exams, were supposed to ensure that students reached at
least a minimal level of proficiency.

But schools in some areas — Texas and New York City were infamous
examples — started pushing out low-performing students. That led to
greater recognition that schools nationwide were, if not going as far as
Texas by actively discouraging the students who most needed their help,
also not doing much to get them to stay and raise their academic
ambitions.

The federal No Child Left Behind Act, which never did much to encourage
higher graduation rates, might be dead, but its successor will have
little chance of succeeding if policymakers aren’t realistic about the
work and patience required to raise standards, test scores and
graduation rates. It’s slow, hard, incremental work without magic
solutions, and improved numbers aren’t always evidence of
better-educated students.

HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T
FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other
Sources
NEW STATE AGENCY GETS INFUSION OF $24 MILLION TO
PROMOTE SCHOOL SUCCESS + LCFF ACCOUNTABILITY | EdSource |
https://t.co/PGjYqhI17f

PARENTS+PRINCIPALS WILL WEIGH IN ON PROP 39 CHARTER CO-LOCATIONS AT L.A. SCHOOL CAMPUSES | LA Times | https://t.co/jfEsKCIOZx

Were they ever really two groups?: FUND SET UP TO RAISE $200 MILLION FOR
LAUSD MERGES WITH CHARTER GROUP | LA Times | https://t.co/RcLL7TR2wX

What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:Scott.Schmerelson@lausd.net • 213-241-8333Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180Ref.Rodriguez@lausd.net • 213-241-5555George.McKenna@lausd.net • 213-241-6382Monica.Ratliff@lausd.net • 213-241-6388Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385Steve.Zimmer@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
...or the Superintendent:superintendent@lausd.net • 213-241-7000
...or your city councilperson, mayor, county supervisor, state
legislator, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the
president. Tell them what you really think! • Find your state
legislator based on your home address. Just go to: http://bit.ly/dqFdq2 • There are 26 mayors and five county supervisors representing jurisdictions within LAUSD, the mayor of LA can be reached at mayor@lacity.org • 213.978.0600
• Call or e-mail Governor Brown: 213-897-0322 e-mail: http://www.govmail.ca.gov/
• Open the dialogue. Write a letter to the editor. Circulate these
thoughts. Talk to the principal and teachers at your local school.
• Speak with your friends, neighbors and coworkers. Stay on top of education issues. Don't take my word for it!
• Get involved at your neighborhood school. Volunteer in the classroom.
Join your PTA. Serve on a School Site Council. Be there for a child -
and ultimately: For all children.
• If you are eligible to become a citizen, BECOME ONE.
• If you a a citizen, REGISTER TO VOTE at http://registertovote.ca.gov/
• If you are registered, VOTE LIKE THE FUTURE DEPENDS ON IT. THEY DO!